Apple Butter

This is one of those posts that was put on the back burner due to life.  Fall in New England is apple time.  And we do love apples in this house.  The kids eat apples sliced with their favorite butter (peanut or sunflower depending on the kid), we make pies, crumbles and more.   But the apple butter is a family favorite and I thought I'd share it with you.  Not only is it great on biscuits, or, simply, on a spoon... but stir 1/2 cup into spice cake or chocolate brownies and up the "Yum"!
  

Apples ready to be made into apples butter

Fall Spice Brown Rice Pudding

I'm trying to eat more brown rice these days.  It's good for you, so I've read.  I've been reading a book on macrobiotics.  There is a lot to macrobiotics.  It is more than just what you eat.  It is how you interact with the world around you.  The energies that flows through everything and how to balance that for better health.  Nutritionally macrobiotics seems to be based on brown rice, beans, soy and vegetables.  Soy doesn't work in our family.  But beans, brown rice and vegetables do.  So I'm moved to do something with brown rice.

Fall Spice Brown Rice Pudding with dried cranberries

I'm also trying to eat breakfast more often.  I'm not really a breakfast person... well unless there is a chocolate cake sitting on the counter.

Mango, black bean quinoa salad

Sometimes you just need something fresh, different, a taste sensation that surprises.  Something different from your "normal" but not too far from your comfort zone.  Something, in fact, that could become comfort food... maybe?

Mango, black bean and quinoa salad with fresh mint.

You're tired of eating rice and decide to cook quinoa.  Fantastic!  Now what??  Well... You just happen to have a mango that needs to be eaten.  And you have mint taking over the garden 'cause everything else died from the mint strangling it.  Okay maybe you don't but I did.  (Imagine that, I had a mango.)

Salt and Vinegar Potato Salad

Okay, yum.  I had seen this recipe around the web in several sites and finally decided to try it.  A potato salad that gets away from the heavy egg-y mayo.  I'm picky about potato salad. I don't like tons of dill.  I don't like pickle relish in it.  I don't like heavy mayo but I've never liked other potato salad dressed with anything else either.  (Eww to German potato salad.  For a girl who likes hash browns with her eggs and bacon, I don't like bacon in my potato salad.)    I haven't had a good potato salad since we went egg free.

Salt and vinegar potato salad

 

Vanilla Ice Cream

Vanilla ice cream was a tough one for me.  I tried a couple of recipes that weren't good.  I think part of it is that those of us who could eat ice cream at one point have a well ingrained memory of what vanilla ice cream should be.  Plus vanilla is a complex but delicate flavor.  Unlike chocolate, where the strong flavor of the chocolate can hide a multitude of "sins", vanilla can be easily overpowered.

I tried hemp milk for the first attempt.  It had a really bitter aftertaste.  Yick.  The second batch had sucanat in it.  Blech.  The taste of the sucunat overpowered the vanilla.  While we like sucunat in quinoa chocolate chip cookies and banana bread, it was too much for the vanilla. The third attempt was better but still had a strong taste from the demara sugar that my younger son didn't like.  (He poured chocolate sauce over the ice cream and ate it anyway.  It didn't slow him down too much.)   But, really, is a stand alone vanilla too much to ask?  

So fourth time's a charm...

Cinnamon Ice Cream

In starting down the road of vegan non-dairy frozen deserts (or "ice cream" for short around here), I asked my kids what type they wanted me to try to make.  Never shy, they hollered:  "Vanilla!", "Chocolate!", "Cinnamon Vanilla!"  Wait... What?  Cinnamon vanilla?  Where did that one come from?  (Hmmm...probably from the cinnamon rolls there were eating at the moment.)

So the second flavor of our trifecta is cinnamon vanilla

Cinnamon (and vanilla in the shadow)

Fantastic!

Banana Bread

We go through periods of intense banana consumption followed by a period of reduced banana consumption and then no banana consumption.  Sometimes there is no warning and all of a sudden I have bananas that are dark and not very appetizing looking.  What to do with the bananas that have ripened so far no one wants to eat them? 

Banana bread hot out of the oven!

Make banana bread! Yummy, yum, yum!

Champagne Mango Ice Cream

Did you know that there are over 50 varieties of mangoes?  And that mango is the most consumed fruit in the world?  (The last comes from Fruit Ninja's fruit facts... so take it with a grain of salt, or a slice of mango.)

Champagne mango ice cream.

Avocado Salad

Today I am feeling lazy.  I took the kids shopping last night after work and we went out to eat.  So today I am tired, run down, lazy if you will.  Wheat makes me sleepy.  I'm sensitive to gluten.  Not to the extent of the rest of my family... but a sandwich makes me, urm, relaxed (sluggish) and a big bowl of pasta puts me down for a nap.  And sometimes the next day I'm still lethargic.  Today is warm and muggy.  Not helping the lethargy...

Avocado salad

Fresh Mint Ice cream for the summertime!

I've been quiet... for almost 2 months.  Did you miss me?  We've been busy here.  Mark's job is taking us to Massachusetts.  Which means that we have to sell the house.  That means that we had to clean the house top to bottom and sort through... stuff.  Lots and lots of stuff.  We've only been here for 5 years.  How did we get so much stuff?

But now it is just wait and see... Who wants to buy a house?

Fresh Mint and Chocolate Chip ice cream

In the meantime I have a small problem.  One son who loves ice cream... and can't eat milk or eggs.  So we need vegan ice cream.  And he can't eat soy which is how most vegan ice cream is made.  (Technically it isn't ice cream unless it has cream in it.  But non-dairy frozen desert sounds rather unappetizing doesn't it?)  And it is summertime.  Summertime demands ice cream...

Chocolate Avocado Cake

So why the cake?  April 1st is a dear friend's birthday.  Very cool right?  It was my older son's due date, although he couldn't wait that long.  And for other reasons April first is a day that we celebrate fondly.  Thus a cake was needed.

Chocolate avocado cake

This idea of avocados and chocolate comes from Joy the Baker's blog. She uses avocados in wonderful ways and I'm sure more of her recipes will be spring boards for some gluten free goodies here too.  I know you're thinking "Weird" right?  Actually "Yum!" is the word for this rich moist chocolate cake.

Cinnamon Crisps

Perfect for tea!  Crispy, crunchy, sinnamon, er, cinnamon-y little delights.  Mmmm.

Cinnamon crisp cookies and tea.

Ranch Dressing

My family's favorite dressing was, for a long time, Buttermilk Ranch.  Since the allergy test results, dressings have become a challenge.  When you take away dairy, sesame, soy, garlic, eggs, vinegar (distilled is the only vinegar we can use), and lemon juice, there isn't much choice.  And when it is required to taste good... that narrows the choices even further.

Ranch Dressing- Vegan and Soy free but still delicious!

The kids liked ranch dressing better than any other type of dressing.  They ate it with everything:

Creme Brulee Anyone?

One of my favorites: milky, eggy, creamy with a crust of sugar on top.  *Sigh* and yum.

Creme Brulee- dairy, egg and soy free

But dairy-free and egg-free creme brulee?  Without tofu? Is it possible? 

Chocolate chip cookies- Ah!

Mmmm the slightly crisp outside, chewy inside and soft gooey chips.  So yummy hot out of the oven that they don't last long in my house

 Quinoa chocolate chip cookies hot from the oven!

Living life gluten free and dairy free makes for interesting baking.  Being egg free as well brings another whole level of interesting to baking.